On December 10, 1963, American news anchor Walter Cronkite ran a story about Beatlemania in the United Kingdom. After seeing the report, 15 year old Marsha Albert of Maryland wrote a letter to local disc jockey Carroll James asking “why can’t we have music like that here in America?” James responded by playing “I Want To Hold Your Hand” on the air.

That was all it took. The British Invasion was underway. Cultures mixed, fans went wild and music was never the same again on either side of the Atlantic.

What about professional gaming? When will that dam break?

E-sports has always been a worldwide phenomenon but the indisputable mecca has long been Seoul, Korea. Seoul was where professionalism resided for the entirety of the last decade. As each great player raised StarCraft to new peaks, the rest of the world wondered, “why can’t we have gamers like that here?”

A new hope.

Enter StarCraft 2, the most hyped e-sports title of all time. For four years, fans wondered if this was the game e-sports was waiting for.

'Would this title take professional gaming to new, global heights?'

From the beta’s release on February 17, 2010 until now, those questions have only begun to be answered. The answers thus far have been positive.

As expected, Seoul immediately took up the reins as the e-sport’s capital city with the most prestigious tournament in the world, the GSL.

Now, talk of competition to Korean dominance is creeping in. Europe and North America are upping the ante with bigger and bigger circuits with leagues such as MLG and IEM. Geoff “iNcontroL” Robinson has let loose a number of teases about a huge e-sports endeavor in Southern California to be revealed later this month. Will it be a major American league?

Jeffrey “Sjow” Brusi and Dario “TLO” Wünsch have each dropped clues about something “a lot like Korea” happening in Sweden. Is there a major European practice house or something else exciting in the works? Time will tell.

At every turn, there is speculation and rumor. The future in the West holds tantalizing prospects for players and fans alike.

For every major foreign player expressing enthusiasm about a trek to Korea, it seems like there’s another player showing coolness to the idea. Even as American Terran Kevin "qxc" Riley revealed his plans to head to Korea this summer, Sjow's comments about potentially choosing to stay in Sweden were still fresh.

TLO went to Korea and promptly returned home to Germany, having since stated that he is happier in Europe.

Jos “Ret” de Kroon has said that his time in Seoul has not gone has he’d hoped and he is seriously considering a return to Europe if the next season of GSL does not go well for him. Ret’s recent win at Assembly in Helsinki may have made Europe’s potentially more lucrative tournament circuit look even more attractive to the flying Dutchman.

Greg “Idra” Fields has declared his intent to play in more foreign tournaments in 2011.

Seoul the giant.

Despite the rising scene in the West and the ambivalence of some players towards Korea, Seoul still stands as the highest peak of StarCraft 2. Winning there catapults you to the top of the gaming world.

As has been the case since Guillaume "Grrrr..." Patry and a group of young Western players took the trip to compete in South Korea in 2000, top foreigners always have the specter of Korea looming large over their futures and pasts.

Since Grrrr...’s 2000 Starleague win made him the most successful foreigner in Korea of all time by far, a number of players have stepped up to compete. Bertrand "ElkY" Grospellier is considered the second most successful foreigner to compete in Korea. Throughout the decade, many non-Koreans such as Assem, Legionnaire, Rekrul, Draco, Ret, Nazgul and more have made their way to Seoul to attempt to slay Goliath.

The current era stretches back to late 2007 when IdrA won the eSTRO SuperStars tournament and was later chosen for a spot on that same team. In 2009, he became the first foreign player to compete in a televised match since Legionnaire in 2005. Idra lost to the Protoss player Trap 1-2.

As StarCraft 2’s release approached, fans wondered if Korean dominance would continue or if foreigners would be able to compete with the best in the world once again.

Money in the scene

In part, the answer to this question rested on what sort of money would be coming into the StarCraft 2 scene. Enter stage left, one of the most important figures in StarCraft 2, Mathew Peterson.

Peterson, known as heosat on the community sites, is the chairman of The Little App Factory (TLAF, a software company) and the sponsor behind Team Liquid, the chief foreign presence in Korea today.

Even before his involvement with Team Liquid, Peterson and TLAF had tested the waters of e-sports. During April and May of 2010, Peterson had become a fan of players like TLO and White-ra.

“I decided the best way to see more was a tournament, so I contacted Husky and the ball started rolling there,” said Peterson. “He was completely dumbfounded when I asked him if he wanted to do a tournament but it turned out to be a lot of fun.”

The resulting competition was the HDH Invitational, one of the most high profile competitions of the early beta. Thanks to Peterson's sponsorship, it boasted a $3,450 prize pool. TLAF also sponsored a Europe vs. America 2v2 and a Plott vs. Plott show match.

“Primarily the show matches were to do some more advertising of our products and to see whether unique show matches were worth considering in the future,” said Peterson. “However, Nazgul got to me before I started working on other ideas and I don’t have the funds to invest in anything new and radical now.”

Nazgul is Victor Goossens, the owner and face of Team Liquid in all its forms since its founding in 2002. In 2002, a younger Nazgul arrived in Korea to play professionally. For the first half of the decade, he became one of the most famous Protoss players on the planet thanks to his quality play (including a particularly memorable series against BoxeR) and his increasingly popular website, TeamLiquid.net.

While Peterson and TLAF were sponsoring show matches and tournaments early on in the StarCraft 2 beta, they were also privately sponsoring one of the most popular new players in the world: Dario “TheLittleOne” Wünsch, known now as TLO.

TLO’s rise to stardom began only weeks into the beta. His atypical style and the fact that he played Random won him fans the world over including Nazgul himself. After Team Liquid’s first StarCraft 2 tournament in March when TLO knocked Nazgul out in the semifinals using Nukes among other surprising weapons, TLO was invited to join Liquid` in short order.

The boys in blue

Peterson explained what happened next: “I had been sponsoring TLO in private for a couple of months and TLO kept saying to me ‘please speak to Naz about sponsoring the whole team’. Eventually I did and I received a proposal from him outlining what the commitments would be. Initially it was a shockingly large amount of money but it looked like a great opportunity to boost e-sports and perhaps see a return.”

TLAF's deal began around the release of StarCraft 2 and is reportedly scheduled to last for 12 months at least.

By the time Nazgul had approached TLAF, significant steps were already being taken by Liquid. The hype that had accompanied StarCraft 2’s announcement and development brought many lucrative opportunities for Team Liquid. Two major tournaments dubbed TSL were launched in 2008 and 2009, dolling out a total of $32,850 in prizes. This dwarfed any StarCraft competition outside of Korea for the time.

Plans for a New York office for the website were already solidified, employees were hired. Team Liquid was transforming from the major StarCraft community to a commercial entity.

Not everything was planned. In fact, according to Peterson, arguably the most significant step Team Liquid has taken was a decision made quickly but surely.

“Korea definitely wasn’t planned at all,” said Peterson. “Once the GSL was announced, I had to wait for Nazgul to wake up, [him] being in Europe and all, and as soon as he came online I said something along the lines of us needing a house in Korea now. He agreed. Haypro, Jinro and TLO were all excited and fo course we sent them as soon as we could. I don’t think it was ever a decision for us, we just knew they had to have the opportunity to go there.”

According to Peterson, within one to two weeks of making the call to send the team to Korea, the boys in blue were on planes headed to Seoul.

Liquid’s house in Seoul with the oGs team seemed like a beachhead for foreigners in the mecca of StarCraft. Boasting Brood War legends such as Ret and Nazgul as well as the fresh face TLO, it sent a strong signal to the rest of the world about non-Koreans' intent in StarCraft 2 to compete on even footing with the best in the world.

Although Idra was certainly the first foreigner playing StarCraft 2 in Korea, the Liquid house was a much more important symbol. The house’s very existence suggested that unlike Brood War, where only a few separate foreigners could compete in Korea, entire teams of skilled professionals could now make the trip if they were willing to dedicate themselves.

The reality of the GSL

Success did not come quickly. During the first GSL, Artosis, Idra, TheLittleOne and TorcH qualified for the 64 man tournament. Only Idra and TheLittleOne advanced out of the round of 64. Both were eliminated in the round of 32. Grrrr..., Smuft, Nazgul and Jinro were knocked out in qualifiers.

The next GSL saw similar results for the foreigners. Idra, TheLittleOne and the Chinese Terran Loner were the only non-Koreans in the tournament. TLO fell in round one while the remaining two were knocked out in the round of 16.

TheLittleOne left Korea in November. It seems clear now that physical sicknesses coupled with home sickness made moving back to Europe the choice for the German.

After two lackluster GSLs for non-Koreans, hopes seemed to be falling for foreign fans as they headed into GSL3. Would a foreigner ever compete seriously at the GSL before the Koreans pulled ahead for good?

On the other hand, GSL3 offered the biggest group of foreigners to compete in a GSL thus far at five.

The Taiwanese Zerg Sen was knocked out in the round of 32 by GSL2 champion NesTea. Swedish Zerg HayprO fell 0-2 in the first round. Dutch Zerg Ret fell in the round of 32 to TheBestfOu. The American Zerg and longest tenured foreigner in Korea, Idra, fell once again in the round of 32.

The Sophisticated Gorilla Terran rises

It was the Swedish Terran Jonathan “Jinro” Walsh who would become a hero to the foreigners. Thanks to a mix of good play and a favorable bracket, Jinro advanced to the semifinals before being eliminated in dominating fashion by eventual champion MC.

Jinro, who has been heavily involved in the StarCraft community for a decade, became the toast of the foreign scene. Although he had never qualified for a GSL before, his advancement to the semifinals was a desperately needed jolt of hope for the non-Koreans. There it was, for all to see: foreigners could compete at the top level.

The January GSL saw four foreigners competing. Idra and Jinro placed into Code S while Ret and Loner played in Code A.

Both Code A players were eliminated early but Idra and Jinro turned in career performances to meet in the quarterfinals in one of the most highly anticipated matches in StarCraft 2 history. When Jinro won and advanced to a second straight semifinals, he secured his place as one of the most famous players in the world.

The future

The next GSL boasts the largest group of foreigners yet. Idra and Jinro remain in Code S while four invitees will be featured in Code A: Huk, HayprO, Ret and Moonglade. Loner has remained qualified for Code A. A GOM foreigner house has been erected in Seoul to help house and provide a training environment for what the GSL no doubt hopes will be a continuous flow of talent into the country.

Despite the growing foreigner presence in Korea, all is not well with the players already there. HayprO and Ret in particular have expressed negative attitudes about their stay in the country. Peterson from TLAF wrote on Reddit.com/r/starcraft that HayprO and Ret were “very infected with Idra-think”, i.e. a perceivable bitterness about the state of the game.

Ret has explicitly stated that he is seriously considering heading back to Europe if things do not go well for him in the upcoming GSL season. His recent €3000 win at Assembly, the expanding tournament circuit in the West and rumors of significantly larger tournaments on the horizon must make the West look even more attractive to the Dutch Zerg.

“I’m sad for Ret,” said Peterson, “because he is a champion who is struggling with a race. Haypro is keeping his card close to his chest.”

Even Idra, considered a mainstay in Korea, has his eyes on tournaments in the West. In an unsurprising conversation, he was been quoted as hating StarCraft 2 and claiming that a significant number of professionals do as well, that the majority of the circuit plays it purely for money and not for any love or even like of the game.

The personal disappointment and unhappiness of certain players has obvious implications for the future of these individuals but it also poses this far reaching question that other top players may well be asking: if this is the state some foreigners in Korea are in, is it worth sacrificing months and years to live in Korea? It is of course up to the individual player to decide on his own.

Of course, this sort of dissatisfaction is not present in every player (when told that Idra implied that every top player hated the game, Jinro joked that maybe Zergs do but he certainly did not). Still, its presence in a number of players in Korea has certainly caught the eye of prospective competitive immigrants.

The GSL may take months to advance through and only awards significant prizes to the very top finishers. Western tournaments thus far have been shorter and the prizes more evenly spread, allowing a player to earn a living while not requiring a gold medal.

The Western world.

The future of foreigners in Korea depends heavily on the path the Western scene takes. Will iNcontroL’s upcoming announcement involve a major, ongoing American tournament? He has stated that it will be the biggest announcement in Western e-sports history. Anything less than a full blown league in California would be a letdown for many.

Will MLG and IEM continue to expand their presence in StarCraft 2? Will Western online tournaments continue to provide a steady stream of income for top players? Will Europe be the site of an exciting new advance in non-Korean StarCraft?

Are Westerners already tempted to stay away from Korea in the long term by competitions closer to home?

Among other teams, Evil Geniuses has discussed a house in Korea for their players. Surely an influx of foreign talent could play a role in improving practicing conditions for the foreigners already in Korea. Will a growing Western tournament circuit tempt teams away from Seoul?

These questions will be answered in the upcoming months. With those answers will come more questions, enough that you won’t be able to look away as the script plays out. Not coincidentally, a sponsor might not mind that.

Admittedly, a comparison of the West to Korea is a lot to ask. Knocking Seoul off as the mecca of StarCraft seems extremely unlikely for quite a while. However, all it would take is a few more excellent and impressive tournaments and the lure of the West may well be too much for most foreign players.

The first year and the next year

It may not feel like it but the first twelve months of competitive StarCraft are just about through. The beta was released on 2/17/10. The first year is nearly gone.

The near future will carry major implications for the future of StarCraft. Fans and players alike should relish it. As bigger and better leagues enter the picture, as more sponsors realize e-sport’s potential and as more viewers take pleasure in our pastime, the entire e-sports scene stands to benefit, to grow and to finally be what we've long hoped for.

Images and sources: FOMOS, TeamLiquid, GosuGamers, ESL, Liquipedia, Wikipedia